In February 2017, the British Council and United Nations ESCAP signed a collaborative agreement to promote the growth of social enterprise and impact investment across the Asia-Pacific region as a means of supporting progress on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Together we are co-operating to provide research, analysis, training, policy dialogues and offer guidance to support policy makers and other stakeholders in formulating and implementing policies and strategies that foster social enterprise and create enabling environments for impact investment.

Interest in social enterprises in Indonesia is growing alongside increased emphasis on entrepreneurship in general. This is evident in the growing number of events, research, and government activities focused on social enterprise. The concept of social enterprise was formally acknowledged for the first time by the Government of Indonesia in 2015, when the People’s Representative Council introduced the National Entrepreneurship Draft Bill and included a definition of social enterprise.

The term ‘Social Enterprise’ is relatively new to Sri Lanka, although the practice of employing business approaches and leveraging market mechanisms to address social problems has a long and distinguished history in the country, in the form of co-operatives, thrift societies, and welfare and development societies.

In the past decade, there has been a surge in social entrepreneurship across Sri Lanka, with new social enterprises established to tackle a myriad of social and environmental problems and foster social inclusion, economic integration and sustainable development.

Social entrepreneurship has grown significantly across Southeast Asia in recent years. We have seen the emergence of social entrepreneurs, who have stepped up to develop financially self-sustaining solutions to address social and environmental challenges in their communities. This rare breed of leader operates across the public, private and third sectors and balances the imperative of creating social impact with the need for financial sustainability.